Including Precepts Relating to Marriage, Divorce, Marital Relations, and Being Alone with a Forbidden Partner

Introduction by Arthur A. Goldberg

1. Categories of Sexual Partners and Acts that are Forbidden

2. The Prohibitions of Homosexual and Bestial Relations

3. The Prohibition of Relations with Other Men's Wives; Marital Status of Minors; Precepts Related to Adultery by a Gentile with a Jewess; Marriage of an Enslaved Woman; Partners with Whom there can be no Status of Marriage (the Divine Code by Rabbi Moshe Weiner, Ask Noah International, 2018, p 13).

2. For His kindness was mighty over us, and the truth of the L-rd is everlasting; praise the L-rd. (Psalm 117)

This shortest Psalm consists of only two verses, which together encompass all humanity. Verse 1 encompasses all non-Jews, and verse 2 encompasses all Jews. These are the two intersecting vectors of the image of G-d within creation, and they are forever joined at a single point of unity, which is the simultaneously transcendent and indwelling Unity of G-d. This point of unity is not easily seen or felt, and that has been the case throughout most of the tumultuous history of the world. However, at one place, at one time, this point of unity was revealed, openly and miraculously, by our Creator Himself. He chose this in His wisdom, so that all of His children, the human race, could know and believe, remember and take it to heart, until the arrival of the Messianic Era. When that time arrives, it will happen because we will be ready - on G-d's terms - to receive Him as the King over the entire world. Such a fundamental revelation need only occur once, if it is unquestionably witnessed and recorded, and commanded by G-d to be preserved for posterity. That revelation took place at Mount Sinai, in the Hebrew year 2448 (1312 B.C.E.1).

1 B.C.E. is Before the Common Era; C.E. is the Common Era (the Divine Code by Rabbi Moshe Weiner, Ask Noah International, 2018, p 16).

At that time, the voice of G-d, the Name of G-d, and the Unity of G-d, were openly revealed. But G-d, in His wisdom, saw it better to withhold from the individuals of the witnessing nation, the Jewish people, an ability to continue living with the intensity of the revelation. Instead, He appointed Moses (Moshe in Hebrew) as His prophet, to receive and transmit all of His commandments for the future generations (Deut. 21-28) (the Divine Code by Rabbi Moshe Weiner, Ask Noah International, 2018, p 16-17).

This included the recording of G-d's encapsulation of His Divine wisdom into written words, which can be absorbed and integrated within the limited human mind. This document, the Five Books of Moses, G-d called the Torah, which means "instruction," and He bequeathed it, along with its explanations, to the Jews as an eternal inheritance (Deut. 33:4). Along with this gift came the entrusting of a great responsibility, because the Torah does not "only" specify the 613 Jewish Commandments (of which the "Ten Commandments" are only a fraction). It also contains the Seven Noahide Commandments for all non-Jews, which G-d commanded to Noah sixteen generations earlier (the Divine Code by Rabbi Moshe Weiner, Ask Noah International, 2018, p 17).

With the ascent of the Jews to nationhood in the Land of Israel, the surrounding nations, and especially the people from those nations who chose to take up residence in the Holy Land, returned to an awareness of the Seven Noahide Commandments. As the Jews encountered national successes and failures during the 440 years preceding, and the 410 years following, the construction of the First Holy Temple by King Solomon, the appeal of the Noahide Code among the surrounding nations waxed and waned (the Divine Code by Rabbi Moshe Weiner, Ask Noah International, 2018, p 17).

During the time of the Second Holy Temple (350 B.C.E.- 70 C.E.), a large movement of "Heaven Fearers" was active in the Roman Empire. These were Gentile adherents to the One G-d of Israel, who directed their religious loyalty to the Jewish Sages and the Holy Temple. It is nearly impossible to find any unbiased sources on this subject outside of the Talmud and Midrash, because after the Temple's destruction, these Torah-observant Gentiles became prime targets of the enforcers of the pagan Roman religion, and later of the missionizing activities of innovative new religions that began to challenge the Divinely appointed authority of the Torah tradition. The best non-Torah historical accounts of the "Heaven Fearers" are in the writings of Josephus.2

After the destruction of the Second Temple, and the Diaspora of the Jewish people among nations that were influenced by religions unfriendly to Judaism, it was necessary for the light and the eternal promise of the Noahide Code to be preserved and guarded by the Jewish Sages within the writings of the Oral Torah tradition (the Divine Code by Rabbi Moshe Weiner, Ask Noah International, 2018, p 17-18).

Their Torah-law rulings and scholarly debates on the Divine obligations of the Gentile world would have been deemed purely academic over the centuries, were it not for the scriptural prophecies of universal peace and return to Torah observance that will occur in the Messianic Era (the Divine Code by Rabbi Moshe Weiner, Ask Noah International, 2018, p 18).

Aside from Rabbi Elijah Benamozegh (1823-1900) in France, who used the title "Noahide" for observers of the seven commandments, there were no contemporary writings on the Noahide Code directed to the Gentile world. Although the seventh Rebbe of Lubavitch, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson (1902-1994), began delivering talks about detailed points of the Noahide Code from the beginning of his leadership in 1951, it was unexpected when, beginning in the 1980's, he put forth an urgent calling to the nations of the world to fulfill their seven commandments, and to the Jewish people at all levels to inform and influence Gentiles concerning the importance of this observance.3

3 See To Perfect the World: The Lubavitcher Rebbe's Call to Teach the Noahide Code to All Mankind, pub. Sichos in English, 2016 (the Divine Code by Rabbi Moshe Weiner, Ask Noah International, 2018, p 18).

I think I cited it correctly. Many people believed the Rebbe was the Messiah. Perhaps he thought that calling to the nations of the world to fulfill their seven commandments was part of his Messianic duty.

In response to the Rebbe's call, many Gentiles around the world began to seek information about how to correctly fulfill the precepts of these seven commandments. Also in response to this calling, Mr. Chaim Reisner of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, founded the Ask Noah organization in the mid-1990's (the Divine Code by Rabbi Moshe Weiner, Ask Noah International, 2018, p 18).

I think I cited it correctly. Many people believed the Rebbe was the Messiah. Perhaps he thought that calling to the nations of the world to fulfill their seven commandments was part of his Messianic duty.

That could be a good explanation. However Jewish world is still very divided about who will be the Messiah. Each Hasidic sect think that their Rebbe is the Messiah. In the end HaShem will decide.

In 1999, I joined Ask Noah to provide Torah-true Noahide outreach, starting as the web master of the web site asknoah.org. Since then, these efforts have reached tens of thousands of Gentiles, and growing numbers of Noahide communities. We soon saw that to fulfill the call for the nations of the world to return to the Noahide commandments, it would be necessary to have organized learning at the local level. We also learned of the Rebbe's efforts for a project to codify the Noahide commandments, in the spirit of the classic Shulhan Aruh (Code of Jewish Law) (the Divine Code by Rabbi Moshe Weiner, Ask Noah International, 2018, p 18).

To undertake this ambitious task, Mr. Reisner traveled to Israel in the summer of 2004, and met with several leading Rabbis and Torah experts, to present them with our plan, and to request their advice. He received positive reactions from each one, as exemplified by this letter from Prof. Nahum Rakover, former Deputy Attorney General of Israel (the Divine Code by Rabbi Moshe Weiner, Ask Noah International, 2018, p 18).

I was very impressed to hear about the projects that you are planning in regard to the Seven Noahide Commandments.

It is very important to produce a "Torah Code of Noahide Law", written by qualified Torah scholars, so Noahides will know their true obligations in detail.

Your other project, to open Torah academies for Noahides to learn about their Mitzvot, sounds very interesting and innovative. The students of these academies will be well acquainted with their obligations, and can become qualified teachers to disseminate the Noahide laws among the nations.